Page 117 of Heir

“No,” he whispered against her skin, pulling open the laces on her shirt, her pants, removing both, leaving a trail of fire down her neck and stomach, going slow, so torturously slow, like he was getting vengeance on her for her smart mouth, for all the times she’d argued with him or snapped.

“Quil—” His name rolled off her tongue, a prayer. “Please—”

“Mmm,” he said. “You should say that more, Sirsha. I’d give you whatever you wanted.”

“Then give me—”

“Not yet.”

He sank to his knees, cradling her hips in his hands, whispering words against her skin that she couldn’t hear but that sang through her blood like magic.

She ran her fingers through his soft hair with one hand, gripped his shoulder with the other, and thanked the skies she had purchase on something because he pushed her to breaking with his clever mouth, his big hands, the heat of his body against hers, the sure way that he held her, as if she belonged to him and always had.

Sirsha wanted to say,Don’t stop. She wanted to say,More.She wanted to throw him on the floor and climb on top of him and claim him the way he was claiming her, but she couldn’t think anything more thanyes. As her pleasure crested, she clasped a hand over her mouth to muffle her cry and then sank into his arms, trembling and liquid.

Rain hit the small window, apat-pat-patthat blurred the world outside, making the room their own isle. Quil looked far too pleased with himself, his cheeks flushed red, mouth parted in a lazy smile. He was, she noted with annoyance, still fully clothed.

She swung her leg over his waist and straddled him, watching the color of his eyes shift, shadows across gold leaves. His breath quickened as she slowly drew off his shirt.

“Now we’re even.” His hands tightened on her bare back. Sirsha tucked her fingers lightly into his waistband, drawing triangles on his skin.

“Not quite.” She relieved him of all his clothing. With only lamplight between them now, she pinned his wrists to either side of his head and kissed him slow, all the while keeping the rest of her skin a breath away from his. Every muscle in his body was taut with desire and he groaned in impatience.

“Sirsha—” he said, his voice resonant, the low strum of an oud echoing across a desert.

“The way you say my name.” She scraped her fingernails along his back, kissed a line down his shoulder. “It’s indecent.”

“Sirsha.” He said it again, quieter this time, and took her face in his hands, his touch so tender that her chin trembled. When she tried to look away, he brought her gaze back, but she shook her head.

“I can’t,” she whispered.Can’t love you. Not when one day, we’ll have to let each other go.She hoped he could see. “Please.”

He nodded, understanding what she didn’t have the strength to say. When he kissed her again, there was no restraint, only need. Shereturned it in kind, melting into him. This—desire, lust, want—this she understood.

Later in the night, they lay together on her bedroll, staring out the broken window into a rainy sky.

“How long have you been planning that?” she asked.

“Since the second you told me that I’d probably enjoy tying you up.”

“Would you?”

He turned toward her with a shadow of a smile that left her flushed. “Perhaps you’ll find out.”

She ran a finger along the sharp line of his jaw, letting him see in her eyes what she thought of that. He made a sound in his throat that made her hungry for him, again.

You’re enjoying this too much, Sirsha told herself.You will regret it.

But by then he’d drawn her into another kiss, one that made her forget everything but him.

The next morning, Sirsha woke before Quil—before anyone—and slipped past the sleeping Jaduna and outside to the cabin’s front porch. The rain had cleared, the mist burning away as the sun rose.

She was breathless for a moment at the beauty of the valley below. The mist had hidden it yesterday, but now, with the sun chasing away the night, its full glory was revealed—huge granite formations, and distant falls roaring from the onslaught of rain. A river ran through the base of the valley, its blue startling against the deep green hills. Sirsha wished she could make her way down there with Quil. While away the hours by the riverside.

She heard the scrape of a boot behind her and turned, smiling, expecting Quil.

Only to find R’zwana.

“Does he know what you did?” R’zwana asked. Sirsha was almost impressed at her sister’s ability to kill a good mood faster than an arrow to the arse. “Does he know there’s a grave with twelve hundred Brijnan villagers in it because you’re a bleeding coward?”

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